will begin to deteriorate. I only fully understood this from talking to Armando Manni, who makes the most expensive, but probably most healthy oil in the world, high up on Mount Amiata in Toscana. His oil has levels of polyphenols that can reach 450mg per litre, compared to 100-250mg in other high quality oils. It is truly beautiful, but most special because, in order to keep the oil as ‘alive’ and valuable to the health as the day it was bottled, instead of using clear glass to show off the colour of the oil he uses dark ultraviolet-resistant glass, and only tiny 100ml bottles. So when they are opened the oil won’t deteriorate as quickly as it would in big bottles. He also treats the oil like wine in that he puts in a layer of inert gas to help prevent oxidisation, before corking the bottles with a synthetic stopper, rather than cork, which he believes can contaminate the oil.
Cooking with olive oil
The last thing to know about the best extra-virgin olive oil is not to use it for frying. For a start, when it is heated to a high temperature it burns easily, changes flavour and the polyphenols begin to lose their properties. Use a lesser olive oil, or even a vegetable, sunflower, or other interesting oil, and keep your extra-virgin oil for making dressings, or drizzling over fish or pasta, so that it has the maximum impact.
‘A big, big difference to every salad you eat’
As with olive oil, the flavour of vinegar and how much you use of it is quite a subjective thing – if you were to eat a salad dressed the way my mother likes it, you might spit it out, because she loves the flavour of vinegar to come through really strongly. At home in Italy, there will always be one bowl of salad on the table just for her, and a big one for everyone else.
I use very little white wine vinegar; I prefer red wine vinegar, and what I actually like most of all is not officially classed as vinegar in Italy (which by law must have 6 per cent alcohol per volume) but is known as condimento morbido (morbido means ‘soft’). This is brewed in the same way as vinegar but is filtered through wood chips, which smooths it out and takes away some of the sharpness, leaving a ‘condiment’ with lower acidity and alcohol – only 3 per cent.
When we talk about good wine we often think of there being great merit if the production is small and intimate, but with wine vinegar, providing you begin with good grapes, there is no such advantage. You can make millions of litres and still have the same quality; it is like brewing beer. However, you can usually be sure that if you buy vinegar from a producer who makes good wine, the vinegar will also be good quality. People tend to think that it isn’t worth spending a few more pounds on a bottle of good vinegar. But, like I always say when people complain about the price of good olive oil, if you think about how little you use at a time, you are only talking about a few pence, which will make a big, big difference to every salad you eat. And the vinegar isn’t going to go off, unless you actually put it in the sun with the top off and let it evaporate.
Balsamic vinegar, which comes from Modena and the surrounding region of Reggio Emilia, is something completely different, which I use only occasionally and sparingly. As far back as 1046, a visiting German Emperor, Henry II, wrote about a special vinegar which ‘flowed in the most perfect manner’, and it has been eulogised ever since as a mysterious, precious elixir. Originally, it was taken as a tonic as much as it was used in cooking – balsamic actually means ‘health-giving’. However, it remained something of a local secret, made in small quantities that you used when a guest came to visit, or at Christmas, but not every day. In Lombardia, I never saw balsamic vinegar until I was about sixteen and started working in restaurants. We didn’t even have any in the kitchen at La Cinzianella. Then, like sun-dried tomatoes, balsamic vinegar suddenly became fashionable all over the world, and people fell in love with it, using it for everything. Because the traditional production in and around Modena was so small, people began manufacturing it commercially to meet the demand – so now there is great confusion about what is the authentic vinegar, and what is just an industrial product that resembles it. In America, especially, there are even balsamic ‘sauces’, ‘glazes’ and ‘creams’ that you can buy in squeezy bottles, like ketchup.
Unlike other vinegars, true balsamic vinegar is made not from wine but from the must of the Trebbiano grape that has been cooked slowly to concentrate it. This is blended with aged wine vinegar, then matured for at least twelve years in a series or family (‘acetaia’) of barrels, which range downward in size, and are made from different woods (typically oak, cherry, chestnut, mulberry, ash and juniper), so that each adds its own character. Each year, as some of the vinegar evaporates, the smallest barrel is topped up with liquid decanted from the next smallest one, and so on, until finally, the last and largest barrel is topped up with freshly cooked must from the new grape harvest. It is a continuous complex, serious art, which produces a naturally thick, syrupy vinegar with a taste that should have a perfect balance of sweetness and acidity. (The barrels are traditionally stored in attics under the rooftops, where the heat of summer and then the cold of winter are intensified, as this naturally prompts the processes of fermentation and oxidization.)
In 1980 a controlled denomination of origin for the vinegar was set up, and by law, for a vinegar to be called aceto balsamico tradizionale, it has to be produced according to these methods and approved by the Consortium of Producers of Traditional Balsamic Vinegar (Consorzio fra Produttori di Aceto Balsamico Tradizionale di Reggio Emilia). If you are a producer, you must send your vinegar to them; they taste it blind and, if it is good enough quality, and meets all the requirements, they bottle it in their special tulip-shaped bottles. They then mark it with different coloured stamps: red for up to 50 years, silver for a minimum of 50 years, and gold for a minimum of 75 years. Production of this balsamic vinegar is very limited, and for some of the people who supply their vinegar to the consorzio it is almost more of a hobby than a business: some will only make 100 or so bottles a year. We are talking about vinegars that cost up to £100 a bottle, but when you taste the real thing, the experience is extraordinary.
There is another category of balsamic vinegar that is either produced outside the designated region of Reggio Emilia, and so cannot be called ‘tradizionale’, or is made by people who don’t want to deal with the consorzio – maybe they have such a small production that it isn’t worth their while. Or sometimes, producers of ‘tradizionale’ also make other, high quality vinegars that haven’t been aged for so long. Such vinegars must be labelled condimento balsamic vinegar and although they can’t be called ‘tradizionale’ they are made using identical methods, so they can be fantastic quality, and are usually cheaper. I have stayed near Modena and seen people go to the local producers with their own bottles, which the guys fill up for them – and it is beautiful vinegar – but, of course, you have to rely on local knowledge to find out where to go.
The big difficulty is over bottles that are just labelled ‘aceto balsamico di Modena’. Ever since the world ‘discovered’ balsamic vinegar there has been a huge industrial production, which bears no relation to the true artisan product. The legal definition of this vinegar is very loose. Much of it is only white wine vinegar with caramel added. I could make it for you in a pot in the kitchen in 15 minutes – but what an insult to the people who have been making beautiful vinegar in the proper way for hundreds of years. Some of it, though, has been made in a way that is similar to the traditional methods, using at least some cooked grape must, and aged in wood for at least a few years. So how to tell? Often ‘aceto balsamico’ vinegar comes in elegant bottles, sealed with wax, with beautiful labels that suggest ancient traditions, but it is important not to be distracted by the lyrical descriptions that the producers tend to use, and go straight to the ingredients list. The first thing to be listed should be the must of the grape, and there should be no mention